“THE Glasgow District Subway, which has already been fully described in our columns, was opened for public traffic yesterday ... The first train .... left Govan Cross at five o’clock in the morning, running by way of Partick, a second leaving Copeland Road and running by way of Kinning Park.
“The early cars were largely taken advantage of by workmen, and from eight to ten o’clock there was a great rush of all classes, the various outlying stations being fairly besieged”.
This, amidst acres of dense newsprint, the Glasgow Herald of Tuesday, December 15, 1896, reported on the birth of the city’s Underground service. The opening day went well, it added, though there was a complete breakdown in the Outer circle, obliging some passengers to leave the trains and walk along the line to the nearest station.
And at 11pm on the first day, 18 people were injured when two trains collided south of St Enoch station. One of the passengers, a young boy of 14, “was removed to the Royal Infirmary in an ambulance waggon”. The subway was closed for a few days “to enable further arrangements to be made in connection with the working”.
The network is widely recognised as being the third oldest in the world, after London and Budapest. Initially, it was a cable-hauled system. Propulsion, explains Strathclyde Partnership for Transport (SPT) was provided by stationary steam engines and the railway was hailed as the first of its type in the world.
In 1923, it was taken over by Glasgow Corporation Transport Department, and in the decade that followed it was converted to electric traction, a third live rail being introduced for that purpose: “The railway ran with little further change until 1977 when the new operators, Greater Glasgow Passenger Transport Executive, closed it for major modernisation investment. The railway in its present form reopened for operation on 16 April 1980”.
In March 1981 the Underground welcomed its 10 millionth passenger -- Mrs Valerie Thomson, of Maryhill, pictured here with her two-and-a-half-year-old daughter, Jacqueline. They were presented with a food hamper by councillor Malcolm Waugh, vice-chairman of Strathclyde region’s highways and transport committee. Mrs Thomson said she used the system several times a week. “It is better, quicker and cheaper than the buses”, she added.
Mr Waugh said the Subway was now running smoothly and could start to pay its own way after the following April. The system had “really caught on” over the past five months, despite a recent 5p fares increase. Research indicated that the initial hope of attracting 15 million travellers annually would be surpassed in the year ahead.
The other image is a driver’s-view of a train pulling into Bridge Street station in 1972.
Read more: Herald Diary
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